The Cobalt-13, a light freighter of Corellian make, streaked through the Arkanis sector on course for a sandy, orange planet. The fiery light of twin suns shone through the viewports of the bluish, disc-shaped shuttle, painting the industrial interior with various hues of white and gold. A human male and his droid ally occupied the main hold of the Cobalt, OA-09 seated at the ships controls while Naatzul Vash, free-thinking fighter and rogue, opened one of the lockers along the wall. He removed a pair of blaster pistols from the locker and loaded them before holstering them on either side of his belt.
"O'nine, gimme a one-two," he said over his shoulder.
"We're on course," the Operant Adviser replied while directing the freighter through Tatooine's upper atmosphere. "We will be landing soon."
Naatzul slung an auto rifle onto his back. "Where's the loot on this dirt rock?"
"Tracking..." O'nine vocalized, multitasking between landing the ship and finding their target. "Three kilometers from destination."
"Damn!" Naatzul ran over to the display to check the reading himself. "Reinforcements will be on us in no time," he growled.
OA-09 swiveled his head to look at his master. "You're not aborting, are you?"
Naatzul scoffed and clipped a string of thermal detonators to his chest. "Hell no!"
OA-09 returned to the controls and positioned the Cobalt-13, landing the freighter directly in front of an Imperial transport. The vehicle ground to a halt, treads digging into the soft ground of the desert planet and kicking up red sand.
"You ready?" Naatzul asked while pressing the switch to deploy the loading ramp.
"I was built ready," O'nine replied. He stood from the pilots chair and walked to the weapons locker.
Naatzul stepped down onto the loading ramp and readied his weapon as stormtroopers dismounted to oppose them.
"When I charge out I'm going to zap their captain first," the human informed his droid partner.
OA-09 glared at Naatzul. "You mean when we charge out."
Naatzul shook his head. "I need you on the bird in case we need to burn sky."
O'nine, previously going for an auto rifle of his own, picked up a sniper rifle instead. He took the long-barreled weapon into his metallic hands and crouched on the ramp of the Cobalt-13, giving him ample view of the Imperial armor without being exposed. Naatzul tossed a detonator at the shuttle and then fired on the stormtroopers in front of him, shooting down two clone soldiers before an explosion tore through the front of the shuttle. Both the driver and captain perished in the blast and Naatzul quickly ran around to the back of the vehicle.
The occassional sniper shot from O'nine kept the stormtroopers at bay while Naatzul used an arc cutter to slice through the armor and get to the treasure inside. Upwards of a dozen silvery chests glittered within, each one containing a pile of valuable crystals. Naatzul switched to his pistol then grabbed a chest with his free hand. OA-09 saw Naatzul come into view and swiftly angled to put a bolt through a stormtrooper's head before moving to pick up the chest.
Naatzul ran off to steal a second chest as O'nine hauled the first aboard the Cobalt. The screech of speeders sounded in the distance and O'nine looked through the viewport to see two scout troopers coming for them at blistering speed, no doubt deployed from the outpost not far from their location.
"Scouts!" OA-09 vocalized at an increased volume.
Naatzul brought another chest to the foot of the ramp. "Just one more," he said.
The human turned to run as O'nine pulled the chest on board and the scouts raced into range. They leaped from their bikes and aimed at Naatzul as he brought the third chest to the ship. Two piercing shots rang out and Naatzul lurched forward, shot through the back.
"Naaztul!" O'nine dropped his rifle and ran to his master as wisps of smoke rose from the scorched holes in his back.
Naatzul Vash turned over to look at his droid, a weak smile on his face. "O'nine... you were with me... 'til the end."
"This is not the end!" O'nine shouted at maximum audio output.
"Take the ship, you're free." Naatzul uttered, ignoring O'nine's protest. "You always were..."
Naatzul's body became still and OA-09 clenched his fists. He glared down the ramp and tore two thermal detonators from Naatzul's belt. With a toss the explosives sailed down to the sandy earth and destroyed the two scouts, their bikes, and the remaining troopers. O'nine slammed on the switch to retract the loading ramp then slumped in the seat in front of the Cobalt-13's controls. With a few flicks the ship lifted from the ground and flew into the sky. Several moments passed and O'nine was in space again before he looked back at Naatzul.
Naatzul's body lay dead at the back of the main hold along with the three chests he had died stealing. His visual sensors lingered on the body of his former owner and O'nine was overtaken by a sudden surge of uncertainty and confusion. What was he supposed to do next? Naatzul could no longer direct him. How did free beings behave? O'nine acted with free will often but it was always in the context of assisting Naatzul in some way. To truly be held to nothing but his own desires was a shock O'nine was not quite ready for.
Organics had a wide range of customs in regards to bodies and the dead. O'nine processed about what Naatzul would want upon his untimely death. Despite being a spacer and smuggler, Naatzul still had a decent relationship with his parents. He would call them from time to time and go on about sentiments that OA-09 would never understand.
"They live on Alderaan..." O'nine vocalized to himself.
He could take Naatzul's body to his parents. OA-09's internal regulators deemed that to the best course of action to take from this point. O'nine put Alderaan into the navigation system of the Cobalt-13 then moved the three chests to the storage room. Once done, he returned to the pilot chair and folded his arms; there was nothing to do now but wait.
The Cobalt-13 lowered on the balcony landing area outside of a pearly tower in the valley of a mountainous region. O'nine stood from the controls and walked to the loading ramp where he pressed the switch and dismounted. A servant stepped out from the grand house and crossed the polished landing to meet the ship.
"Identify yourself," the serviceman demanded, confusion taking his face at the sight of a droid.
"Ninth series Operant Adviser, ADN: 47813" Even if O'nine's face could move, he be still be void of expression in this moment. "I seek the Nobles Vash."
After a brief verifying of O'nine's information, the guard looked up. "To what end?"
"Their son is dead."
The guard blinked and then turned on his heels to head back inside. O'nine returned to the Cobalt to retrieve Naatzul's body. He took the limp form in both arms and walked down the ramp as Mister and Misses Vash came out of their home. The wife raised a hand to her mouth in disbelief but Naatzul's father hardly reacted. Their eyes locked on O'nine and did not waiver. Once within only a few feet of the parents he lowered the body to the ground before them and removed the first few wraps around Naatzul's head. His mother shrieked and his father frowned before pulling out a communicator. O'nine watched Naatzul's mother kneel over her son's body.
"How did this happen?" she wailed.
If O'nine were to become nonfunctional, there would be no mourning. There wasn't even a creator that had built him personally and would care for his well-being as an organic parent might. OA-09 was a machine built by machines. The only being that ever cared about him was dead.
"Imperial scouts," O'nine said to the weeping mother.
She looked up at him, tears spilling down her face.
"Come inside, dear." Mister Vash called to his wife. He pointed at O'nine. "You stay there."
O'nine titled his head as the wife left them. "Excuse me?"
"My engineer is on his way," Mister Vash explained. "You will be repaired, wiped, and auctioned, as will that ship."
"I am free and the ship is mine," OA-09 said.
"Do not claim what is not yours," Mister Vash said and O'nine felt gears grinding in the base of head.
"Those are the words of your son," O'nine clarified.
Naatzul's father shrugged. "He's dead," he said coldly with his son lying still at his feet. "You belong to me."
O'nine took a step backward. He was a droid and yet between him and Naatzul's father only one of them seemed to be moved by Naatzul's death.
O'nine turned his left to see an Imperial transport settle on the landing platform. A pair of officers stepped out of the vehicle and by their uniforms he gathered that they were medical personnel. OA-09 assumed they were coming to handle the body but they were still Imperials. If O'nine could sneer at them would have. Instead he turned and started walking back to the Cobalt.
"Droid, stop!"
O'nine didn't bother looking back to see who said that. Clearly Naatzul's father had no respect for the will of his son, which meant he also would not honor O'nine's freedom. A blaster clicked behind him and O'nine's self preservation protocol urged him to sprint the remaining distance to the Cobalt-13. He cleared the loading ramp in a few long strides and pressed the switch for the slope to retract into the ship. Soon after, the automaton dropped into the pilot's chair and typed on the freighter's controls. O'nine did not set a final destination, his only input told the ship to leave the immediate area. The Cobalt hovered upward away from the landing and angled for the sky before blasting into space, a trail of blue in its wake.
Not many droids owned themselves. This was especially true of the Outer Rim, where Imperial regulations decayed into nonexistence. Such was the bitter reality of the Empire. It was official in a way that was useful for individuals that had their affairs in order. On the other hand even an unscrewed bolt could engender fierce oppression. O'nine did not have the documents of his manufacture and stormtroopers liked to put boots to necks, even when dealing with droids. A free droid would fare better in the Outer Rim, where laws were more lax.
O'nine looked at the navigation of his ship and scrolled over to the sector of the galaxy he desired. The Deralia system caught his sensors, especially the moon of Aderalis. O'nine set his course for that location even though he had never been there before. Or maybe that was precisely what caught his attention; new beginnings and opportunities. He had no idea what was on Aderalis but one thing was certain, the Empire wouldn't be. Of course in the absence of the Empire there was guaranteed to be plenty of criminals, hunters, and other scum.
The Cobalt-13 lowered down through the smoggy atmosphere of Aderalis, space lanes crisscrossing above grungy skyscrapers. Usually the lower levels of a city-planet were unclean while the upper level was polished but the entirety of this station was covered in grime.
"This place needs an oil bath," O'nine while looking out at the area. He directed the Cobalt down to a vacant lot and stood from the controls. The same could be said of O'nine himself. Naaztul had given him an oil bath soon after they first met, but since then, years of grit had gathered on his wells and outer coverings.
Most would fear the pirates, hunters and other villains that occupied moons such as this yet O'nine found them to be preferable to the Empire. The Empire regularly fought in force, no less than than a squad of four troopers. Hunters and pirates often operated solo or perhaps with a partner; these evildoers were possibly more fair and honest than the fearsome regime of the Empire. O'nine had traveled with a rogue spacer long enough to know how they worked and had a few tricks of his own as well.
O'nine armed himself with a blaster and an auto rifle before leaving the ship. Most organics would never dream of letting a droid have a weapon. That's because most organics saw droids purely as servants. O'nine's programming registered Naatzul as his master but their actual relationship was nothing like that. It was fortunate for O'nine that he had so much experience acting on his own; such opportunities would make him better suited for a life that was truly his own.
O'nine met with a Sullustan in a jumpsuit after stepping off his ship. The short, thick-jowled humanoid walked down the line of landing platforms at a brisk pace with a datapad in hand and stopped in front of the Cobalt-13.
"Is your owner still on the ship?" the organic asked.
O'nine's steely blue sensors scanned the dock worker. "I am my owner."
"What?" the worker tilted his head. "What is that ship doing there?"
O'nine walked past the worker. "It's a landing pad. I landed."
"But it's not your landing pad!" the Sullustan said.
"It doesn't belong to anyone," OA-09 vocalized over his shoulder.
"There's a schedule!" the dock worker insisted. "Grallsin, captain of the Vyssrr, is landing here in a few moments!"
"Tell him I'm in the bar."